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ABRAHAM LINCOLN 





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PRESENT!; 



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ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 



AN ADDRESS 



DELIVERED BEFORE 



R. E, Lee Camp, No. 1, Confederate Veterans, 



AT 



RICHMOND, VA., ON OCTOBER 29th, 1909, 



BY 



Hon. GEORGE L. CHRISTIAN. 



Published by Order of the Camp. 



RICHMOND: 

WM. ELLIS JONES, BOOK AND JOB PRINTER. 
1909. 



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ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 



"Out of the old fieldes, 
Cometh al this new corne." — Chaucer. 

Comrades of Lee Camp, Ladies and Gentlemen : 

By a resolution adopted by the imanimous vote of this 
Camp, I have been asked to deliver an address on the life and 
character of Abraham Lincoln, late President of the United States. 
Believing the request a reasonable one to be preferred by the Camp, 
and that such a request from the Camp to one of its members is 
equivalent to a command, I have, with some hesitation, and with 
greater distrust of my ability to meet the expectations of the 
Camp, undertaken the fulfilment of the uncongenial and perhaps 
unprofitable task thus imposed upon me. I wish to state in the 
outset that what I shall say on this occasion will be said in no 
spirit of carping criticism, wdth no desire to do injustice to my 
remarkable subject, and will be as free from sectional prejudice and 
passion as one who has suffered as I have, by the conduct of Mr. 
Lincoln and his followers, can make it; and I shall also strive td 
say what I do say solely in the interest of the truth of history. 

''Ye shall l-noiv the truth, and the truth shall make you free/' 
is a maxim of the Divine Teacher, and it embodies a principle which 
should be the "guiding star" of every writer of history. The ti'uth 
about the cause, the character and conduct of the leaders in the 
great conflict from '61 to '65 is all that we of the South ask, or 
have a right to ask, and ive should he satisfied with nothing less 
than the truth about these. 

Whenever the good character of a person is put in issue, the 
party avouching that good character challenges the opposite side 
to show, by all legitimate means, the contrary of the fact thus 
put in issue. In the war l:)etween the States the character and 
conduct of the leaders on both sides were necessarily involved, and 
especially was this true of the character and conduct of the official 
heads of the respective sides. Last year was the centennial of the 
birth of Jefferson Davis, the civic leader and official head of the 
Southern Confederacy; the South duly celebrated tliat centennial 



and avouched to the world the conduct and the character of their 
representative head and his leadersliip, and we think every one 
who loves the memory of the Confederacy, and of our great struggle 
to maintain it, ought to feel gratified and satisfied with the result. 

This year is the centennial of the birth of Abraham Lincoln, the 
civic leader and official head of the United States during the exist- 
ence of the Confederac}', and the Xorth has with singular temerity, 
as it seems to us, thrust his character and conduct before the world, 
some of them even claiming that he was the "greatest, wisest and 
godliest man that has appeared on the earth since Christ/' (See 
Facts and Falsehoods, 4.) 

This being true, and since some Southern writers have united in 
these, it seems to us, unmerited adulations of this man, no apology 
would seem to be necessary for enquiring as to the real basis of 
the claims of these eulogists of Mr. Lincoln to the admiration, 
veneration and alleged greatness now attempted to be heaped upon 
him. 

In this discussion we would, if we could do so and speak the 
truth, gladly adopt the Eoman maxim, to speak nothing but good 
of the dead. But since some of Mr. Lincoln's nearest -and dearest 
friends (?) have not seen fit, or been able to do this, surely a 
Southern writer should not be criticized or judged harshly for 
repeating what some of these friends, who apparently l^new him 
best and loved him most, and who tell us they are only telling 
what they know to be true of this remarkable man, have to say 
about him, his character and his conduct. 

That the career of Mr. Lincoln was one of the most remarkable 
recorded in history, and that he must have had some element of 
character which m,ade that career possible, no one will deny. But 
that he was the pious and exem])lary Christian, the great and 
good man, "the prophet, priest and king," the "^Yashington," the 
"Moses," the "Second to Christ," now being portrayed to the 
world by some of his prejudiced and intemperate admirers, we 
unhesitatingly deny, and we think it our duty, both to ourselves and 
to our children, to correct some of the false impressions attempted 
to be made about this man's character and career, let the criticisms 
or consequences be what they may. 

We have no right to do so, and we do not object, in tlie least, 
that Mr. Lincoln shall be put forward as the representative man 



and ideal of the S'ortli; but we do object to, and protest against, 
his being proclaimed to the world as the exemplar and representa- 
tive of the South and its people. "We proclaim AYashington, Henry, 
JefEerson, Madison, Monroe, Jefferson Davis, Eobert E. Lee, "Stone- 
wall" Jackson, Joseph E. and Albert Sydney Johnston, Wade Hamp- 
ton, Jeb Stuart, and such like men, as our heroes and ideals and 
as the exemplars for our children and our children's children. 

REASONS FOR LIXCOLn's FAME. 

There are three reasons which we think in great measure account 
for the erroneous conceiDtions and extravagant portrayals now being 
made of Mr. Lincoln, viz : 

(1) The cause of which he was the official head has, temporarily 
at least, been deemed a success. 

(2) The manner of his death was such as to shock all right- 
thinking people and to create sympathy in his behalf; for, like the 
great Eoman Germanicus, it may well be said, he was most fortunate 
in the circumstances of his death. 

(3) He was the first President of the Eepublican party — the 
party which has practically dominated this country ever since Mr. 
Lincoln's first election. 

The acts and doings of that party during the time he was its 
official head, many of which were illegal, unconstitutional, tyran- 
nical and oppressive, will be judged, to a degree at least, by 
the character and conduct of the man who held that official posi- 
tion; and the representatives of that party have, therefore, hesi- 
tated at nothing to try to make it appear that their official leader 
was a great and good man, and that, therefore, they were justified 
in following his leadership. 

In the course of this address we shall say but little of Mr. Lin- 
coln's private life, and shall refer to it only to show that much of 
it was utterly at variance with the life of the man now being por- 
trayed to us; and we shall certainly not criticise his humble and 
obscure birth and origin, but, on the contrary, we extol him for 
being able to rise so far as he did above these, believing, as we do, 
with Pope, that 

"Honor and shame from no condition rise, 
Act well your part; there all the honor lies." 



AVAS THE NORTHERN CAUSE SUCCESSFUL? 

As to the cause of which he was the official liead being successful, 
we will only remark that it was certainly successful in preventing 
the establishment of the Southern Confederacy within certain terri- 
torial limits ; but whether successful in any other sense^ remains yet 
to be determined. The Washington Post of August 14, 1906, said: 

"Let us be frank about it. Tlie day the people of the North 
responded to Abraham Lincoln's call for troops to coerce sov- 
ereign States, the Eepul)lic died and the Nation was born." 

And a Massachusetts man has written of the Confederates that — 

"Such character and achievement were not all in vain ; that 
though the Confederacy fell as an actual physical power, it 
lives eternally in its just cause — the cause of constitutional 
liberty." 

MANNER OF LINCOLN'S DEATH AND THE MURDER OF MRS. SURRATT. 

As to the manner of Mr. Lincoln's death, aside from the abhor- 
rence with which we regard and denounce every form of assassina- 
tion, we have to remark : ( 1 ) That it really exalted his name and 
fame as nothing before it happened had done, or, in our opinion, 
could have done; and (2) as dastardly, as cowardly and cruel as 
that deed was, it was, in our opinion, not so dastardl}', cowardly or 
cruel, and no more criminal in the eye of the law, than the murder 
of Mrs. Surratt, an innocent woman, by Andrew Johnson, Edwin 
M. Stanton, Joseph Holt, David Hunter and their wicked and 
cowardly associates. The act of Booth was that of a frenzied 
fanatic, taking his life in his own hands, and attempting to avenge 
his people's wrongs by ridding the world of the man he believed 
to be the author of those wrongs ; the act of Johnson, Stanton and 
others in murdering Mrs, Surratt was the deliberate and criminal 
act of cruel, cowardly men, perpetrated on a helpless, harmless and 
innocent woman, through instrumentalities and forms as cruel as 
any that were ever devised in the darkest ages of the world, but 
by methods and at a time when the perpetrators knew that their 
cowardly bodies were safe from all harm. (See DeWitt's Assassi- 
nation of Lincoln, p. 92, et seq.) This woman was tried and con- 
victed by a military commission, of which General David Himter 
was the president. It was pointed out to the so-called court, by that 



great law^yer, Reverdy Johnson, that snch a tribunal had no juris- 
diction to try the case, and it was afterwards expressedly so decided 
in Ex parte MlUigan, 4th Wallace. But this commission convicted 
this woman, who even such a creature as Ben Butler said was per- 
fectly innocent, thereby bringing themselves within the principle 
stated by Lord Brougham in a famous case, when he said : 

"When the laws can act, every other mode of punishing 
supposed crimes is itself an enormous crime." 

EXAGGERATIONS ABOUT LINCOLN AND APOTHEOSIS AFTER HIS ASSASSI- 

TION. 

In all our reading, we know of no man whose merits have been 
so exaggerated and whose demerits have been so minimized as have 
those of Abraham Lincoln. Indeed, this course has been so insist- 
ently and persistently pursued by some Xorthern writers that it 
amounts to a patent perversion of the truth, and a positive fraud 
on the puhlic. 

General Don Piatt, an officer in the Federal Army^ a man of char- 
acter and culture, says : 

"With us, when a leader dies, all good men go to lying about 
him. * * * Abraham Lincoln has almost disappeared from 
human knowledge. I hear of him, and I read of him in eulo- 
gies and biographies, but I fail to recognize the man I knew 
in life."' (Facts and Falsehoods,, ip. 36-7; Men Who Saved the 
Union, p. 28.) 

William H. Herndon, Mr. Lincoln's close friend and law partner 
for t^venty years, who, we are informed, wrote a biography of him 
in 1866, which is said to have been bought up and suppressed, sim- 
ply because it told the unvarnished truth, said : 

"I deplore the many publications pretending to be biog- 
raphies of Lincoln, which teemed from the press so long as 
there was hope for gain. Out of the mass of these works, of 
only one (Holland's) is it possible to speak with any degree 
of respect." (Facts and Falsehoods, p. 37; Lanion's Preface, 
iii.) 

And Ward Hill Lamon, who was Mr. Lincoln's close friend and 
at one time his law partner, who was especially selected by Mr. 
Lincoln to accompany him on his luidnight journey to the capital 
when he was to be inaugurated, who was appointed by him marshal 



8 

of the District of Columbia, who was j^robably his closest and most 
confidential friend and adviser during his whole official life, says 
immediately after his assassination, "there was the fiercest rivalry 
as to who should canonize him in the most solemn words, who should 
compare him to the most sacred character in all history. He was 
prophet, priest and king. He was AVashington. He was Moses. 
He was likened to Christ the Eedeemer. He was likened to God." 
{Facts and Falsehoods, |). 9 ; Lamon, 312.) 

Again says Lamon: 

"Lincoln's apotheosis was not only planned but executed 
by men who were unfriendly to him while he lived, and that 
the deification took place with showy magnificence some time 
after the great man's lips were sealed in death. Men who had 
exhausted the resources of their skill and ingenuity in venomous 
detraction of the living Lincoln, especially during the last 
v^ears of his life, were the first when the assassin's bullet had 
closed the career of the great-hearted statesman to undertake 
the self-imposed task of guarding his memory — not as a human 
being endowed with mighty intellect and extraordinary vir- 
tues, hut as a god." {Lamon's Recollections of Lincoln, p. 
169.) 

And again he says : 

For days and nights after his assassination "it was consid- 
ered treason to be seen in public with a smile on the face. 
Men who spoke evil of the fallen chief, or ventured a doubt 
concerning the ineffable purity and saintliness of his life, were 
pursued by mobs, were beaten to death with paving stones, or 
strung up by the neck to lamp posts." {Lamon, 312.) 

"We shall attempt to show you that this whole apotheosis business 
not only took place, as Lamon says, after Mr. Lincoln's assassination, 
and because of the manner of his death, but why it was begun 
then, and has continued until this day. 

We have already said that Mr. Lincoln was the first President 
of the Republican party. He was the official head of that party 
through the most terrible and trying conflict recorded in history. 
The leaders of that party were, and are still, in need of a real hero. 
They knew that they and their conduct would be judged by the 
character and conduct of their official head. The country was 
stunned and dazed by the assassination of this leader — the first 
assassination of the kind in its history. The South was prostrate 



and helpless at the feet of the North, and its leaders charged with 
complicity in that awful crime. That time, of all others, afforded 
the leaders of the Eepublican part}- — always quick and bold in 
action — the opportunity to deify this its first President; and those 
leaders, with a stroke of audacity and genius never surpassed, seized 
upon that opportunity and manufactured a false glamour with 
which they have surrounded the name and fame of their chosen 
head calculated to deceive the "very elect"; and they have so 
persisted in their efforts in this direction, from that day to this, 
that the lapse of nearly half a century has failed to dispel the delu- 
sions manufactured at that time and amid these surroundings by 
these people. Mr. Lincoln is credited with the saying: 

"You can fool some of the people all the time; you can fool 
all the people some of the time, but it is impossible to fool all 
the people all the time." 

We believe the time is coming, if it is not already here, when the 
scales will fall from the eyes of a great many in regard to the true 
history and character of this chosen hero of the North, 

CHARACTERISTICS OF LIXCOLN. 

Of course, within the limits of this paper, we shall make no 
attempt to do more than to give some glimpses of the true charac- 
ter, characteristics and conduct of Mr. Linclon, nor shall we 
attempt to follow his biographers in their details of the career and 
conduct of this enigmatical man. 

Lamon says he was "morbid, moody, meditative, thinking much 
of himself, and the things pertaining to himself, regarding other 
men as instruments furnished to hand for the accomplishment of 
views which he knew were important to him, and therefore consid- 
ered important to the public. Mr. Lincoln was a man apart from 
the rest of his kind. * * * jje seemed to make boon companions 
of the coarsest men on the list of his acquaintances — low, vulgar, 
unfortunate creatures." * * * '-j^ -^^g ^^[^ ^j^g^^ j^g j^^^j j^q 

heart — that is, no personal attachments warm and strong enough 
to govern his passions. It was seldom that he praised anybody, 
and when he did, it was not a rival or an equal in the struggle for 
popularity and power." * * * "Xo one knew better how to damn 
with faint praise, or to divide the glory of another by being the 



10 

first and frankest to acknowledge it.'' — {Lainon, pp. -iSU-l.) * * * 
"He did nothing out of mere gratitude, and forgot the devotion of 
his warmest partizans as soon as the occasion for their services 
passed." — Id., p. 482. * * * "Notwithstanding his overwean- 
ing ambition, and tlie l)reathless eagerness with which he pursued 
the objects of it, he had not a particle of sympathy with the great 
mass of his fellow-citizens wlio were engaged in similar struggles 
for place."— 7r/., p. 483. 

Xow mark you, this is what Lamon, his closest friend, and most 
ardent admirer, has to say of the "make up" of Mr. Lincoln. Is 
this the stuff of which the world's great characters, heroes, martyrs, 
and the exemplars for our children are made? Surely it would 
seem not, and further comment is deemed unnecessary. 

LINCOLN NOT A CHRISTIAN. 

One of the commonest, and one of the most attractive, claims 
now asserted by the admirers of Mr. Lincoln is, that he was a pious 
man and a Christian. I^amon tells us after his assassination he 
was compared to the Saviour and Eedeemer of mankind. One of his 
reverend admirers compares his assassination to the crucifixion of 
our Lord ; and since both of these events occurred on Good Friday, 
this writer says "even the day was fit." But since Mr. Lincoln's 
"taking off" was in a theater, it may l)e noted that this fanatical 
divine says nothing as to the fitness of the place at which this 
"taking off' occurred. 

Another divine, in an oration delivered this 3'ear on the centen- 
nial anniversary of Mr. Lincoln's birth, begins it with the words : 

"There was a man sent from God whose name was Abraham 
Lincoln." 

He then speaks of him as being "like unto Melchizedek,'' and as 
the "one great man, and mystery and miracle of the nineteenth cen- 
tury." 

It seems to us that the real mystery here is the fact that any one 
an where should be so foolish in this enliglitened age as to suppose 
he can jiiake sensible peo])le swallow any such twaddle, nonsense 
and sacrilege as this. 

Herndon says of Mr. Lincoln's alleged Christianity : 

"Lincoln was a deep-grounded infidel. He disliked and 



Jl 

despised churches. He never entered a church except to scoff 
and ridicule. On coming from a church he would mimic the 
preacher. Before running for any office, he wrote a book 
against Christianit}^ and the Bible. He showed it to some 
of his friends and read extracts. A man named Hill was 
greatly shocked and urged Lincoln not to publish it; urged it 
would kill him politically. Hill got this book in his hands, 
opened the stove door, and it went up in flames and ashes. 
After that Lincoln became more discreet, and when running 
for office often used words and phrases to make it appear that 
he was a Christian. He never changed on this subject; he 
lived and died a deep-grounded infidel." (Facts and False- 
hoods, p. 53.) (See also Lamon, 489-i93.) 

Lamon says : 

"Mr. Lincoln was never a mem])er of any church, nor did 
he believe in the inspiration of the Scriptures in the sense un- 
derstood by evangelical Christians." * * * "Overwhelming 
testimony out of many mouths, and none stronger than out of 
his own, place these facts beyond controversy." {Lamon, p. 
486.) * * * "When he went to church at all, he went to 
mock, and came away to mimic." {Id., p. 487.) 

Lamon further says : 

"It was not until after Mr. Lincoln's death that his alleged 
orthodoxy became the principal topic of his etdogists; hut since 
then the effort on the part of some political writers and speak- 
ers to impress the public mind erroneously seems to have been 
general and systematic." {Id., 487.) 

He then inserts the letters of a number of Mr. Lincoln's closest 
friends and neighbors, all of whom fully sustain his statements. 
One of these says : 

"Lincoln was enthusiastic in his infidelity." 

Another says: 

"Lincoln went further against Christian beliefs and doctrines 
and principles than any man I ever heard. He shocked me." 
{Id., 488.) 

Another (Herndon) says: 

"Lincoln told me a thousand times that he did not believe 
the Bible was a revelation from God as the Christian world 
contends." * * * ''And that Jesus was not the Son of 
God." {Id., 489.) 



12 

Another (Judge David Davis) says: 

"He had no faith, in the Christian sense of the term." (Id., 
489.) 

Lamon then quotes Mrs. Lincoln as saying: 

'*'Mr. Lincoln liad no hope and no faith, in the usual accept- 
ance of those words." (Id., 489.) 

And Mr. Nicolay, Lincoln's private secretary, as saying: 

"Mr. Lincoln did not, to my knowledge, in any way change 
his religious views, opinions or beliefs from the time he left 
Springfield to the day of his death." (Id., 492.) 

It seems to us that these statements from these sources ought to 
settle this question, and that it is wrong, and nothing short of an 
outrage on the truth of history to assert that Mr. Lincoln was, 
or ever claimed to be, a Christian; that such an assertion can only 
reflect on those who make it, and must bring upon them the appli- 
cation of the maxim, falsus in una falsus in omnibus; for surely 
those who are so reckless as to misrepresent a fact of this nature 
will not hesitate to misrepresent any other fact that it suits them 
to misrepresent or to misstate, 

COXTRADICTIONS OF CHARACTER. 

We come now to consider some other phases of this strange 
man, his conduct and his character. 

First. We think it can be safely affirmed that Mr. Lincoln was 
one of the most secretive, crafty, cunning and contradictory charac- 
ters in all history, and therein lies, we believe, the true reason 
why the world now deems him great. In short, he and his unscrupu- 
lous eulogists have, for the time being, outwitted and deceived 
the public. Mr. Seward said his "cunning amounted to genius"; 
and if there ever was on this earth a judge of real cunning, William 
H. Seward was that man. The best evidence of the contradictions 
of his character is furnished by Holland, one of his most partisan 
admirers and biographers. Mr. Holland says, at page 241 : 

"To illustrate the effect of the peculiarity of Mr. Lincoln's 
intercourse with men, it may be said that men who knew him 
through all his professional and political life have offered 
opinions as diametrically opposed as this, viz : That he was a 



13 

very ambitions man, and that he was without a particle of 
ambition; that he was one of the saddest men that ever lived, 
and that he was one of the jolliest men that ever lived ; that 
he was very religious, but that he was not a Christian; that 
he was a Christian, but did not know it; that he was so far 
from being a religious man or Christian that the least said 
on that subject the better; that he was the most cunning 
man in America, and that he had not a particle of cunning 
in him; that he had the strongest personal attachments, and 
that he had no personal attachments at all, only a general 
good feeling toward everybody; that he was a man of indomit- 
able will, and that he was a man almost without a will; that 
he was a tyrant, and that he was the softest-hearted, most 
brotherly man that ever lived; that he was remarkable for his 
pure-mindedness, and that he was the foulest in his jests and 
stories of any man in the country; that he was the wittiest 
man, and that he was only a retailer of the wit of others; 
that his apparent candor and fairness were only apparent, and 
that they were as real as his head and his hands ; tliat he was a 
boor, and that he was in all essential respects a gentleman ; that 
he was a leader of the people, and that he was always led by 
the people; that he was cool and impassive, and that he was 
susceptible of the strongest passions." 

Now it seems to us, with all deference to the opinions of others, 
that any man who could play the chameleon and present to the 
world such contrasts and contradictions of character as are here 
described must be singularly devoid of the finest ingredients which 
are essential to real greatness, viz : unwavering and steadfast devo- 
tion to principle and to duty and that uniform bearing towards his 
fellow-man which can only lift those who have these characteristics 
into the atmosphere of true greatness. 

Another of Mr. Lincoln's friends, a brother lawyer, having been 
asked to describe him, says : 

"My opinion ctf him was formed b}' a personal and profes- 
sional acquaintance of over ten years, and has not been altered 
or influenced by any of his promotions in public life. The 
adulations by base multitudes of a living, and the pageantry 
surrounding a dead President, do not shake my well-settled 
convictions of the man's mental calibre. Phrenologically and 
physiologically, the man was a sort of monstrosity. His frame 
was large, bony and muscular; his head was small and dispro- 
portionately shaped ; he had large, square jaws ; a large, heavy 
nose; a small, lascivious mouth; soft, tender, bluish eyes. I 
would say he was a cross between Venus and Hercules. I 



14 

believe it to be inconsistent with the law of himian organism 
for any such creature to possess a mind capable of anything 
great. The man's mind partook of the incongruities of his 
body. It was the peculiarities of his mental, and the oddity 
of his physical structure, as well as his head, that singled 
him out from the mass of men." (See 3 Ilerndon & Weih, p. 
584.) 

Mr. Morse in tbe preface of his biography makes this very re- 
markable statement. He says: 

"If the world ever settles down to the acceptance of any 
definite, accurate picture of him (Lincoln), it 'will surely he a 
false picture. There must ahvays be vague, indefinable uncer- 
tainties in any presentation of him which shall be truly made." 

Is this the record of any other of the world's great heroes and 
leaders? AVill any accurate picture of any one of them "surely 
be a false picture"? What does Mr. Morse mean, anyhow? 

We have heretofore referred to the fact that Mr. Lincoln was 
secretive, cunning, crafty and tricky, and certainly his course dur- 
ing his public life, as will be pointed out later on, fully sustains 
this view of his character. We have already noted what Mr. Seward 
had to say of this feature of his character. Herndon says : 

"The first impression of a stranger, on seeing Mr. Lincoln 
walk, was tbat he was a tricky man."' {Facts and Falsehoods, 
p. 5L) 

The du])licity practiced by him in preventing the renomination 
of Hamlin, as described by Colonel McClure in "Lincoln and Men 
of War Times," is a striking illustration of his ability in this direc- 
tion. 

Stanton says : 

"I met Lincoln at the bar and found him a low, cunning 
clown." (Facts and Falsehoods, p. 19.) 

And several of his biographers nuike reference to his secretive- 
ness, cunning and craftiness as among his cliief characteristics. 

OPIXIOXS OF COXTE:\rPORAKIES. 

But one of the best evidenct-s of the real wortli and true cliaracter 
of a man is siiown by the estimation in which lie was held 
by his contemporaries and those who were brought in daily con- 



15 

tact with him. Up to the time of the assassination of Mr. Lincoln, 
several niemhers of his cabinet were engaged in wliat Lamon calls 
"venomous detractions" of his character both as a man and as a 
statesman. Xor were these detractions by any means confined to 
his cabinet. Besides Seward, Stanton and Chase of the cabinet, 
Hamlin, Freemont, Sumner, Trumbull, Wade, Wilson, Thad. Ste- 
vens, Beecher, Henry Winter Davis, Greeley and Wendell Phillips 
were among those who did not hesitate to denounce and belittle 
him in every way in their power. Members of his cabinet were in 
the habit of referring to him as "the baboon at the other end of 
the avenue,"' and some senators referred to him as the "idiot of 
the White House." {Facts and Falsehoods, p. 9.) Lamon says: 

"The opposition to Lincoln became more and more offensive. 
Tlie leaders resorted to every means in their power to thwart 
him. This opposition continued to the end of liis life." (Idem, 
p. 32.) 

Xicolay and Hay say that — 

"Even to coiiiplete strangers Chase could not write without 
speaking slightingly of President Lincoln. He kept up this 
habit to the end of Lincoln's life. Chase's attitude toward the 
President varied between the limits of active Ijrutality and 
benevolent contempt." (Idem, p/ 12.) 

Colonel McClure says : 

"Outside of the cabinet, the leaders were quite as distrustful 
of President Lincoln's abilitv to fill the o;reat office he held." 
(Idem. p. 32.) " • 

x\nd Charles Francis Adams (the elder), in liis memorial address 
on Mr. Seward, says Mr. Lincoln was "selected partly on account of 
the alisence of positive qualities," and "with a mind not open to 
the nature of the crisis." 

And he further says : 

"Mr. Lincoln (in his contact with Seward) could not fail to 
perceive the fact that whatever estimate he might put on his 
own natural judgment, he had to deal with a superior in 
native intellectual power, in extent of acquirement, in l)readth 
of philosophical experience, and in the force of moral dis- 
cipline. On the other hand, Mr. Seward could not have been 
long blind to the deficiencies of his chief in these respects." 
(See Well's Reply to Adams, p. 24.) 



16 



DOMINATED BY SEWARD AND STAXTON. 

And Joseph Medill, of the Chicago Tribune, wrote to Schuyler 
Colfax in 1862^ saying: 

"Seward must he got out of the cahinet; he is Lincoln's evil 
genius. He has been President de facto, and has kept a sponge 
saturated with chloroform to Uncle Abe's nose all the while, 
except one or two brief spells." (1 Bancroft's Seward, p — .) 

The "Pennsylvankin" characterized Mr. Lincoln's first inaugural 
as a "tiger's claw concealed under the fur of Sewardism/' and the 
"Atlas and Argus," of Albany, as "weak, rambling, loose- jointed" 
and as "inviting civil war." (See 2 TarhelVs Lincoln, p. 13.) 

We refer to these last citations especially to show, what we have 
always maintained, viz : that Mr. Lincoln was dominated by Seward 
and Stanton, in our opinion, two of the worst men this country 
has ever produced. 

In his speech at Cooper Institute in 1864 Wendell Phillips 
said : 

"I judge Mr. Lincoln by his acts, his violations of the law, 
his overthow of liberty in the Northern States. I judge Mr. 
Lincoln by his words and deeds, and so judging him, I am 
unwilling to trust Abraham Lincoln with the future of this 
country. Mr. Lincoln is a politician; politicians are like the 
bones of a horse's fore shoulder — not a straight one in it." 
{Facts and Falsehoods, p. 17.) 

Mr. Lincoln was asked if he had seen the speech of Wendell 
Phillips, and he said : 

"I have seen enough to satisfy me that I am a failure, not 
only in the opinion of the people in rebellion, but of many 
distinguished politicians of my own party." (Lamon's Recol- 
lections, p. 187.) 

But enough of this; and we have made these citations only for 
the purpose of showing, first, that the character of Mr. Lincoln, as 
now presented to the world, is utterly at variance with his character 
as understood by those who knew him best and were daily brought 
in contact with him whilst living; and, secondly, to show that if 
his character was such as is presented to us by those who best 
knew him in life, that character was in keeping with his conduct 
towards the people of the South in the great war from '61 to '65. 



.17 



SOME VIOLATIONS OF THE CONSTITUTION. 

"VVe, therefore, come now to consider some of the things (because 
we can only refer to a few of them) which Mr. Lincoln did in 
bringing on, and in the conduct of, that war. 

Wlien Mr. Lincoln Avas inaugurated as President of the United 
States on the 4th of March, 1861, he took an oath to support the 
Constitution of the LTnited States. Says one of his most ardent 
admirers, McClure : 

"As the sworn executive of the nation, it was his duty to 
obey the Constitution in all its provisions, and he accepted 
that duty without reservation." 

In his first inaugural, Mr. Lincoln said : 

"I have no purpose, directly or indirectly, to interfere with 
the institution of slavery in the States where it exists. I 
believe I have no lawful right to do so, and I have no inclina- 
tion to do so." 

And yet we know that within eighteen months from that time 
he issued his Emancipation Proclamation. 

EMANCIPATION PROCLAMATION. 

As to this proclamation, it is worthy of remark, that it is claimed 
to have been issued by virtue of some kind of "war power" vested 
in the President by the Constitution and laws. Tlte Nortlieni Jiis- 
torian Rhodes, Vol. 4, p. 213, saj^s: 

"There was, as every one knows, no authority for the jirocla- 
mation in the letter of the Constitution, nor was there any- 
statute that warranted it." 

Let us ask, then, where did Mr. Lincoln find any authority to 
issue it ? Certainly not in the Constitution. For, says the Su- 
preme Court of the United States in Ex parte MiUlgan, 4 Wallace 

120: 

"The Constitution of the United States is a law for rulers 
and people equally in war and in peace, and covers with the 
shield of its protection all classes of men at all times and un- 
der all circumstances. Xo doctrine involving more pernicious 
consequences was ever invented by the wit of man than that 
any of its provisions can be suspended during any of the great 



18 

exigencies of government. Such a doctrine leads directly to 
anarchy or despotism." 

And says Ciiicf Justice Chase, in the same case^ p. 136-7 : 

"XeitJif'r President, nor Congress, nor courts, possess any 
power not giren by tlie Constitution." 

So that the issning of that proclamation (wliich, it is also worthy 
of note, did not even attempt to emancipate all tlie shives in all the 
States, as generally snjjposed, hut onh' those in ten named States, 
and only in certain parts of some of these) was a palpable 
violation of the Constitution and of Mr. Lincoln's oath of office; 
and the only plea on which the friends of Mr. Lincoln can justify 
his conduct is the plea of "necessity," the last refuge of every 
tyrant. 

DUPLICITY TOWARDS VIRGINIA COMMISSIOXERS. 

But before we refer to other violations of the Constitution we 
propose to consider some acts of deceit and duplicity practiced by 
Mr. Lincoln, or to which he was a part}', on representatives of the 
South. 

After the secession of seven of the Southern States and the 
formation of the Southern Confederacy, with its capital at Mont- 
gomery, and after the failure of the "Peace Conference" inaugurated 
by Virginia in her most earnest efforts to prevent war between the 
sections, and during the sessions of the Virginia Convention that 
body determined to send commissioners to Washington to ascer- 
tain, if possible, what course Mr. Lincoln intended to pursue towards 
the seceded States, since it was impossible to determine this course 
from the ambiguous language employed in his inaugural address. 
These commissioners, the Honorables "William Ballard Preston, 
Alexander H. H. Stuart and George W. Eandolph, went to Wash- 
ington and had an interview with Mr. Lincoln, and an account 
of that interview will be found in the first volume "Southern His- 
torical Society Papers,"' at page 443. At page 45"?, Mr. Stuart 
says: 

"I remember that he (Lincoln) used this homely expres- 
sion, 'If I do that (recognize the Southern Confederacy), what 
will become of my revenue? I might as well shut up house- 
keeping at once.' " 

But, says Mr. Stuart, "his declarations were distinctly pacific, 
and he expressly disclaimed all purpose of war." 



19 

Mr. Seward, the Secretary of State, and Mr. Bates, the Attorney- 
General, also gave Mr. Stuart the same assurances of peace. That 
night the commissioners returned to Richmond, and the same train 
on which they traveled brought Mr. Lincoln's proclamation calling 
for seventy-five thousand men to wage a war of coercion against the 
Southern States. 

"This i^roclamation," says Mr. Stuart, "was carefully with- 
held from us, although it Avas in print, and we knew nothing 
of it until Monday morning Avlien it appeared in the Richmond 
papers. When I saw it at breakfast, I thought it must be a 
mischievous hoax, for I could not believe Lincoln guilty of 
such duplicity." 

This proclamation is now conceded by nearly all Xorthern Avriters 
to be a virtual declaration of Avar, Avhicli Congress alone has the 
power to declare. Congress alone having the poAver to "raise and 
support armies" ; to "provide for calling forth the militia to execute 
the laws of the Union, suppress insurrection and repel invasions"; 
to "provide for organizing, arming and disciplining the militia, and 
for governing such part of them as may be employed in the service 
of the United States." 

And yet Mr. Lincoln, in violation of the Constitution and of his 
oath, did all of these things before Congress Avas alloAved to assem- 
ble on the 4th of July, 1861, and it is said he had an organized 
army before the assembling of Congress of over three hundred thou- 
sand men. We know too that, without any authority to do so, he 
did not hesitate to suspend the privilege of the Avrit of habeas corpus, 
which Congress alone had the power to authorize the suspension of, 
according to the decision of Chief Justice Taney in Merriman's 
case, and there are numerous other decisions to the same effect. 

DUrLICITY TOAVARDS COXFEDERATE COMMISSIOXERS. 

But again, Ave knoAV too (at least, Mr. SeAvard says so), that Mr, 
Lincoln was a party to the duplicity and deception practiced through 
Mr. Seward on the commissioners sent by the Confederate Govern- 
ment to treat with him "Avitli a vicAv to speedy adjustment of all 
questions growing out of the political separation upon such terms 
of amity and good will as the respectiA-e interests, geographical con- 
tiguity and future Avelfarc of the tAvo nations may render neces- 
sary." 



20 

Mr. Lincoln and Mr. Seward practiced this deception on these 
commissioners by promising the evacuation of Fort Sumter, 
through Justices Campbell and Xelson, of the Supreme Court of 
the United States. Mr. Seward was charged by Judge Campbell 
with the enormity of his conduct in regard to this matter, and 
he was asked to explain it, but no explanation was ever made, sim- 
ply because there was none that could be made. 

VIOLATIONS OF RULES OF CIVILIZED AVARFARE. 

But again, Mr. Lincoln was the Commander-in-chief of the Armies 
and Xavies of the United States, and he, therefore, had the power, 
and it ivas his duty, to see that the war was conducted on the princi- 
ples adopted by the Federals themselves for the government of their 
armies, and which are those adopted and enforced by all civilized 
nations. Two of the most important of these rule swere : 

(1) "That private property, unless forfeited by crimes, or 
by offences of the owner against the safety of the arm}', or the 
dignity of the United States, and after conviction of the owner 
by court martial, can be seized only by way of military neces- 
sity for the sujDport or benefit of tlie army of the United 
States. 

(2) "All wanton violations committed against persons in 
the invaded country, all destruction of property not com- 
manded by the authorized officer, ^11 robbery, all pillage, all 
sacking even after taking a place by main force, all rape, 
wounding, maiming or killing of such inhabitants, are pro- 
hibited under penalty of death, or such other severe punish- 
ment as may seem adequate for the gravity of the offence." 

Now, we repeat, these were the rules adopted by the United 
States for the government of its armies in the field, and it teas 
the duty of Mr. Lincoln, as the Execiilive Itead of tlte government 
and Commander-in-chief of its armies, to see tliat they were respected 
and enforced. We know^ how ]:)a]pably these rules were violated 
by Grant, Shernum, Sheridan, Pope. Butler. Hunter, Milroy, Stein- 
weyer, and in fact by nearly every Federal commander; and ive 
l-now too tJtat these officers would not have dared to ttiiis violate 
these rules, unless these violations had been l-nown by litem to be 
sanctioned by their official head, Mr. Lincoln, from tvhom they 
received their appointments and commissions, and whose duty it 
was to prevent such violations and outrages. 



21 

General McClellan, a gentleman and a trained soldier, wrote to 
Mr. Lincoln from Harrison's Landing on July 7, 18G?, saying, 
among other things : 

"In prosecuting the war, all private property and unarmed 
persons should l)e strictly jsrotected, subject only to the neces- 
sity of military operations. All property taken for military use 
should be paid or receipted for, pillage and waste should be 
treated as high crimes, and all unnecessary trespass sternly 
prohibited, and offensive demeanor by the military towards 
citizens promptl}' rebuked." (See 2 Am. Con flirt, hi/ Greeley, 
page 248.) 

And yet, within two weeks from tliat time, the Federal Secretary 
of War, 1)1] order of Mr. Lincoln, issued an order to the military 
commanders in Virginia, South Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Ala- 
bama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Texas and Arkansas, directing them 
to seize and use any property belonging to the inhalntants of the 
Confederacy which might be necessary or convenient for their sev- 
eral commands; and no provision whatever was made for any com- 
pensation to the owners of private projierty thus directed to be 
seized and appropriated. 

SHEEMAX'S CONDUCT. 

General Sherman says in his official report of his famous (or 
rather infamous) march to the sea : 

"We consumed the corn and fodder in the region of country 
thirty miles on either side of a line from Atlanta to Savannah, 
also the sweet potatoes, hogs, sheep and poultry, and carried 
off more than ten thousand horses and mules. I estimate the 
damage done to the State of Georgia at one hundred million 
dollars, at least twenty millions of which inured to our benefit, 
and the remainder was simply waste and destruction." 

General Halleck, who was at that time Lincoln's chief of staff, 
and, therefore, presumably in daily contact with him, wrote to Sher- 
man on the 18th of December, 18G4:: 

"Should you capture Charleston, I hope that hy some acci- 
dent the place may be destroyed, and if a little salt should be 
thrown upon its site it may prevent the future growth of nulli- 
fication and secession." 

To which Sherman replied on the 24th of the same month : 



22 

^'1 will bear in mind your hint as to Charleston, and do 
not think that salt will be necessary. When I move, the Fif- 
teenth Corps will be on the right of the right wing, and their 
position will naturally bring them into Charleston first; and 
if you have watched the history of that corps, you will have 
remarked that they generallv do their work pretty well," etc. 
(2 Sherman's Memoirs, pp. 223-227-8.) 

Of this infamous conduct on the part of Sherman, Mr. AVhitelaw 
Eeid, of IS^ew York, our present representative at the Court of St. 
James, has recently written in "Ohio in the War," pp. 475-8-9, 
referring esj)ecially to the burning of Columbia, as follows: 

"It was the most monstrous barbarity of this barbarous 
march. * * * "Before this movement began. General Sher- 
man begged permission to turn his army loose in South Caro- 
lina and devastate it. He used this permission to the full. He 
protested that he did not wage war upon women and children. 
But, under the operation of his orders, the last morsel of 
food was taken from hundreds of destitute families, that his 
soldiers might feast in needless and riotous abundance. Before 
his eyes rose, day after day, the mournful clouds of smoke on 
every side, that told of old people and their grandchildren 
driven, in mid-winter, from the only roofs there were to shelter 
them, by the flames which the wantonness of his soldiers had 
kindled." * * * "Yet, if a single soldier was punished for 
a single outrage or theft during that entire movement, we have 
found no mention of it in all the voluminous records of the 
march." 

Let us ask. Who alone had any semblance of authority to give 
this permission to Sherman and who gave it? There can be but 
one answer — x\l)raham Lincoln, the then President of the United 
States. Will the people of the South lick the hand that thus smote 
their fathers, their mothers, their brethren and their sisters by 
now singing peans of glory to his name and fame ? 

"Lord God of hosts, defend us yet 
Lest we forget, lest we forget." 

The Xew York Evening Post, one of the most sectional papers 
in the countr}^, said editorially, a short time since, that — 

"Mention of Sherman still opens flood gates of bitterness. 
He was a purloiner of silver; his soldiers spared neither 
women nor children; he burned towns that had not ojSended, 
and cities that had surrendered; and he spared not even the 



23 

convents occupied by women of his own religions faith." (See 
Myer's letter in "Confederate Cause and Conduct/' p. 84.) 

GKAXT AND SHERIDAx's CONDUCT. 

On the 5th of August, 1864, General Grant wrote to General 
David Hunter, who preceded Sheridan in command of the Valley : 

"In pushing up the Shenandoah Valley, where it is expected 
you M'ill have to go first or last, it is desirable that nothing 
should he left to invite the enemy to return. Take all pro- 
visions, forage and stock wanted for the use of your command; 
suck as cannot he consumed, destroy." 

And it was Grant who suggested to Sheridan the order that Sheri- 
dan executed in so desolating the Valley that "a crow flying over 
it would have to carry his own rations." Sheridan says: 

'•I have destroyed over two thousand barns filled with wheat 
and hay and farming implements ; over seventy mills filled with 
flour and wheat; have driven in front of the army over four 
thousand head of stock, and have killed and issued to the 
trooj^s not less than three thousand sheep. This destruction 
embraces the Luray A'alley and Little Fort Valley, as well as 
the main Valley." 

Contrast these orders, and this conduct, with General Lee's 
Chaml)ersburg order of June 27, 1863, when his army invaded 
Pennsylvania, and the conduct of his army in that hostile country, 
and you have the difference between barbarous and civilized war- 
fare.* General Lee's order was approved by President Davis; 

* "Headquarters A. N. V., 
"Chambersbi-kg, Pa., June 27, 1863. 
"General Orders No. 73. 

"The Commanding General has marked with satisfaction the con- 
duct of the troops on the march and confidently anticipates results com- 
mensurate with the high spirit they have manifested. No troops could 
have displayed greater fortitude or better performed the arduous 
marches of the first ten days. Their conduct in other respects has, 
with few exceptions, been in keeping with their character as soldiers, 
and entitles them to approbation and praise. 

"There have, however, been instances of forgetfulness on the part 
of some, that they have in keeping the yet unsullied reputation of the 
army, and the duties exacted of us by Civilization and Christianity, are 
not less obligatory in the country of the enemy than in our own. The 



24 

Grant's, Sherman's, Sheridan's and others by President Lincoln. 
To which of these two will you men and women of the South render 
the meed of your reverence, honor and respect? I know your 
answer, because I know and honor you. 

But this is, by no means, all. Judge Jeremiah S. Blac-k, of 
Pennsylvania, writing to Mr. Charles Francis x4dams, said : 

"I will not pain you hy a recital of the wanton cruelties they 
(the Lincoln administration) inflicted upon unoffending citi- 
zens. I have neither space, nor skill, nor time, to paint them. 
A life-sized picture of them would cover more canvas than there 
is on the earth. * * * gj^^g ^]^g fj^H ^f Robespierre, noth- 
ing has occurred to cast so much disrepute on republican insti- 
tiTtions." (See BJacVs Essays, p. 153.) 

Verily, 

"He left a Corsair's name to other times 
Linked with one virtue and a thousand crimes." 

GENERAL LEE's LETTER TO THE PEOPLE OF MAEYLAXD. 

In the address issued by General Lee to the people of Maryland 
when his army first entered that State, in September, 1862, he said: 

"It is right that you should know the purpose that brought 
the army under my command within the limits of your State, 

Commanding General considers that no greater disgrace could befall 
the army, and through it our whole people, than the perpetration of 
the barbarous outrages upon the innocent and defenceless and the wan- 
ton destruction of private property that have marked the course of 
the enemy in our own country. Such proceedings not only disgrace 
the perpetrators and all connected with them, but are subversive of the 
discipline and efficiency of the army and destructive of the ends of 
our present movements. It must be remembered that we make war 
only on armed men, and that we cannot take vengeance for the wrongs 
our people have suffered without lowering ourselves in the eyes of all 
whose abhorrence has been excited by the atrocities of our enemy, and 
offending against Him to whom vengeance belongeth, without whose 
favor and support our efforts must all prove in vain. The Command- 
ing General therefore earnestly exhorts the troops to abstain, with most 
scrupulous care, from unnecessary or wanton injury to private prop- 
erty; and to enjoin upon all officers to arrest and bring to summary 
punishment all who shall in any way offend against the orders on this 
subject. 

"R. E. LEE, General:' 



25 

so far as that purpose concerns 3'ourselves. The people of the 
Confederate States have long watched with the deepest S3'm- 
path}^ the wrongs and outrages that have been inflicted upon 
the citizens of a commonwealth allied to the States of the 
South b}- the strongest social, ])olitieal and commercial ties. 
They have seen with profound indignation their sister State 
deprived of every right and reduced to the condition of a con- 
quered province. Under the pretense of supporting the Con- 
stitution, but in violation of its most valuable provisions, your 
citizens have been arrested and imprisoned upon no charge, 
and contrary to all forms of law. The faithful and manly 
protest against this outrage made by the venerable and illus- 
trious Mary lander (Taney), to Avhom in better days no citizen 
appealed for right in vain, was treated with scorn and con- 
tempt; the government of your chief city has been usurped 
by armed strangers; your legislature has been dissolved by 
the unlawful arrest of its members; freedom of the press and 
of speech has been suppressed ; words have been declared 
offences by an arbitrary decree of the Federal Executive, and 
citizens ordered to be tried by a military commission for what 
they may dare to speak. Believing that the people of Mary- 
land possessed a spirit too lofty to submit to such a govern- 
ment, the people of the South have long wished to aid you in 
throwing off this foreign yoke, to enable you again to enjoy 
the inalienable rights of freemen, and restore independence 
and sovereignty to your State. In obedience to this wish, our 
army has come among you, and is prepared to assist you with 
the power of its arms in regaining the rights of which you 
have been despoiled. 

"This, citizens of Maryland, is our mission, so far as you 
are concerned. Xo constraint upon your free will is int-ended ; 
no intimidation will be allowed within the limits of this army, 
at least. Marylanders shall once more enjoy their ancient free- 
dom of thought and speech. AVe know no enemies among you, 
and will protect all, of every opinion. It is for you to decide 
your destiny freely and without constraint. This army will 
respect your choice, whatever it may be ; and while the South- 
ern people will rejoice to welcome you to your natural position 
among them, they will only welcome you when you come of 
your own free will. 

"R. E. Lee, General Commanding." 

No more severe or more just arraignment of the tyranny prac- 
ticed by Lincoln's administration can be written than this, and 
that it is true no one will have the temerity to deny. The contrast 
here presented, too, is as striking as it is painful. It is that between 
the Christian soldier and the Godless tyrant. 



26 

WHAT XOETHERX PEOPLE THOUGHT IX NOVEMBER, 1864. 

And it should never be forgotten that in the election held in 
November, 1864. between Lincoln and McClellan, in which the 
platform of McClellan's party charged that the war had been a 
failure; that the Constitution had been disregarded in every part; 
that justice, humanity, liberty and the public welfare demanded 
that immediate efforts be made for a cessation of hostilities with 
the ultimate convention of all the States that these may be restored 
on the basis of a federal union of all the States; * * * that they 
considered the administration's "usurpation of extraordinary and 
dangerous powers not granted by the Constitution" as "calculated to 
prevent a restoration of the union" ; and which further charged that 
administration with "woeful disregard of its duty to prisoners of 
war"; that during this canvass Lincoln was denounced as a "re- 
morseless tyrant," and his administration as the "Eebellion of 
Abraham Lincoln." That out of a vote of four millions of the 
Xorthern people cast in that election, nearly one-half, viz., 1,800,- 
000 voted for McCIeUaii and in condemnation of Mr. Lincoln on 
the foregoing platform and charges. So with this evidence of the 
condemnation of Mr. Lincoln and his administration, just five 
months before his death, by so many of his own people, we must 
be excused if we decline to accept the portraiture of his character 
and conduct as now so persistently presented to us by these same 
people, and we must be excused too for being skeptical about their 
sinceritij in dcUeving in the truthfulness of tliat portrailure them- 
selves. 

"We charge, and without the fear of successful contradiction, that 
Mr. Lincoln, as the head of the Federal Government, and the Com- 
mander-in-chief of its armies, was directly responsible for the out- 
rages committed hy his suhordinates; and that the futws and un- 
prejudiced historian icill so hold him responsible, we verily believe. 

TREATMENT OF PRISONERS. 

But this is not all. Mr. Lincoln was directly responsible for all 
the sorrows, sufferings and deaths of prisoners on both sides during 
the war. At the beginning of the war, the Confederate Covernment 
enacted that "rations furnished prisoners of war shall be the same 
in quantity and quality as those furnished to enlisted men in the 



27 

army of the Confederacy"; that "^'hospitals for prisoners of war are 
placed on the same footing as other Confederate States' hospitals 
in all respects, and will be managed accordingly." And General 
Lee says, "The orders always were that the whole field should be 
treated alike; parties were sent out to take the Federal wounded 
as well as Confederate, and the surgeons were told to treat the 
one as they did the other. These orders given by me were respected 
on very field." 

At the very beginning of hostilities, the Confederate authorities 
were likewise most anxious to establish a cartel for the exchange 
of prisoners. The Federals refused to do this until July 23, 1868, 
and almost directly after this cartel was established it was violated 
and annulled by the Federal authorities with Mr. Lincoln at their 
head. On the 6th of July, 1861, Mr. Davis wrote to Mr. Lincoln, 
saying : 

"It is the desire of this government so to conduct the war 
now existing as to mitigate its horrors as far as may be possible, 
and with this intent its treatment of the prisoners captured 
by its forces has been marked by the greatest humanity and 
leniency consistent with public obligation." 

This letter was sent to Washington by a special messenger (Colo- 
nel Taylor), but he was refused even an audience with Mr. Lincoln, 
and although a reply was promised, no reply to it was ever made. 

On the 2d of July, 1863, Mr. Davis addressed another letter to 
Mr. Lincoln and tried to send it to him by the hands of Vice-Presi- 
dent Stephens, saying: 

"I believe I have just grounds of complaint against the offi- 
cers and forces under your command for breach of the cartel ; 
and being myself ready to execute it at all times, and in good 
faith, I am not justified in doubting the existence of the same 
disposition on your part. In addition to this matter, I have 
to complain of the conduct of your officers and troops in many 
parts of the country, who violate all the rules of war by carrying 
on hostilities not only against armed foes, but against non- 
combatants, aged men, women and children, while others not 
only seize such property as is required for the use of your 
troops, but destroy all private property within their reach," etc. 

And he implored Mr. Lincoln to take steps "to prevent further 
misunderstanding as to the terms of the cartel, and to enter into 
such arrangement and understanding about the mode of carrying on 



28 

liostilities between the belligerents as shall confine the severities of 
the war within snch limits as are rightfully imposed, not only by 
modern civilization, but by our common Christianity." 

And yet Mr. Stephens, with a letter of this import, was not even 
permitted to go through the lines to carry it. • 

Mr. Charles A. Dana, the Assistant Federal Secretary of War, 
the same man who iiermitted the shackles to be placed upon Mr. 
Davis, says : 

"The evidence must be taken as conclusive : It proves that 
it was not the Confederate authorities who insisted on keeping 
our prisoners in distress, want and disease, but the com- 
mander of our armies." 

And that commander-in-chief of their armies, the one who had 
absolute control of the wliole matter, was Abraham Lincoln. We 
know that President Davis even went so far when the prisoners 
at Anderson ville were suffering from disease and want, which the 
Confederate Government could not relieve or prevent, as to send 
a delegation of these prisoners to Mr. Lincoln to beg him to renew 
the cartel for their exchange, and Mr. Lincoln sent these men 
back to die ; and, further, that when Mr. Davis offered to send home 
from ten to fifteen thousand of these prisoners at one time, without 
demanding any equivalent in exchange, this humane offer was indig- 
nantly rejected ; that medicines were declared "contraband of 
war," and the Federal Government not only refused to furnish these 
for their own prisoners, to be administered by its own doctors, but 
refused to allow the Confederates the means to procure them when 
they were informed that tliese prisoners were dying on account of 
the need of these medicines. Hence we say that Mr. Lincoln, as 
the head of the Federal Government and the Commander-in-chief of 
its armies, is directly responsible for all tltis misconduct and cruelty 
on the part of his subordinates, and for the deaths, sufferings and 
sorrows which ensued in consequence of that misconduct and cru- 
elty. 

WAS HE A TRUE FRIEND OF THE SOUTH? 

But it is often said that, notwithstanding all these things, Mr. 
Lincoln was a friend of the Southern people, and that his death 
was a great misfortune to the South, since he would have been able 
to prevent the outrages, severities and cruelties of "Reconstruction." 



29 

As some evidence of this, it is claimed, first, that in tlie so-called 
"Peace Conference" held in Hampton Eoads in February, 1865, 
Mr. Lincoln offered, if the South would return to the Union, that 
the Federal Government would pay for the slaves by making an 
appropriation of four hundred millions of dollars for that purpose. 
Indeed, it is claimed that he said to Mr. Stephens : 

"Let me write 'L^nion' at the toj) of this page, and you may 
then write any other terms of settlement you may deem proper." 

"We undertake to say, after a careful reading of the joint and 
several reports of our commissioners (Messrs. Stephens, Hunter 
and Campbell), and after reading the message sent by Mr. Lincoln 
to Congress after his return from that conference, that there is 
no jiLst foundation for any such claim. 

Mr. Lincoln himself says : 

"Xo papers were exchanged or produced, and it was in ad- 
vance agreed that the conversation was to be informal and 
verbal merel}'. On our part, the whole substance of the instruc- 
tions to tlie Secretary of State Jiereinhefore recited tvas stated 
and insisted upon, and nothing was said inconsistent there- 
ivith." 

The instructions to the Secretary here referred to in reference to 
slavery were : 

"No receding by the Executive of the United States on the 
slavery question from the position assumed thereon in the 
annual message to Congress and in preceding documents." 

And the terms here referred to in the annual message to Con- 
gress were : 

"7 retract nothing heretofore said as to slavery. I repeat 
tlie declaration made a year ago, that while I remain in my 
present position I will not attempt to retract or modify tlie 
Emancipation Proclamation." 

Certainly there was nothing in the Emancipation Proclamation 
which indicated any intention or desire on his part to make any 
compensation for the slaves of the Southern people. 

And Colonel McClure, who, as before stated, is a jiartizan of Mr. 
Lincoln, and claims everything for him that could possibly be 
claimed, says this matter was not even suggested by Mr. Lincoln 



30 

to Mr. Stephens, for reasons which lie attempts to explain. (See 
Lincoln and Men of War Times, p. 92.) 

But again it is claimed that Mr. Lincoln would have been most 
lenient and kind in his treatment of the people of the South after 
the termination of the war, and that hence his death was a great 
calamity to the South. The sole basis of this claim seems to be 
that when Mr. Lincoln came to Eiehmond on the 5th of April, 
1865, two days after the evacuation by the Confederates, he had a 
conference with Judge Campbell, Assistant Secretary of War of 
the Confederacy, and Mr. Gustavus A. Myers, then a member of 
the Legislature from Eichmond, and suggested to them to have 
the Virginia Legislature re-assemble for the purpose of restoring 
Virginia to the Union. In a statement published in Vol. 36, page 
252, of the "Southern Historical Society Papers,'' Judge Campbell 
gives an interesting account of this interview with Mr. Lincoln, 
and says, among other things : 

"Mr. Lincoln desired the Legislature of Virginia to be 
called together to ascertain and test its disposition to co-operate 
with him in terminating the war. He desired it to recall the 
troops of Virginia from the Confederate service, and to attorn 
to the United States and to suhmit to the national authority." 

Judge Campbell further says that whilst he (Campbell) ex- 
pressed the opinion that General Lee's army was in such a condi- 
tion that it could not be held together for many days, "Mr. Lin- 
coln did not fully credit the judgment that was expressed as to the 
condition of General Lee's army. He could not realize the fact 
that its dissolution was certain in any event, and that its day was 
spent. He knew that if the 'very Legislature' that had been sitting 
in Eichmond were convened and did vote as he desired, that it 
would disorganize and discourage the Confederate army and gov- 
ernment." 

In our opinion, this was the true and only reason why Mr. Lin- 
coln wanted the Legislature recalled. It was that it might order 
the withdrawal of the Virginia troops, with General Lee at their 
head, from the Army of Northern Virginia, and in that way destroy 
the efficiency of that army. 

But whatever may have been Mr. Lincoln's motives and pur- 
poses at that time, we know that as soon as he knew that the Army 
of Northern Virginia had surrendered, and only two days before his 



31 

assassin at ion, he recalled tlie sugijesfion for the asstemhling of fJie 
Virginia Legislature because of the fact, as alleged, that conditions 
had changed since he made that suggestion; and the great change 
in these conditions teas the surrender of the Army of Nortliern 
Virginia. And Colonel McClure himself says, at page .227: 

"What policy of reconstruction Lincoln looidd have adopted, 
had he lived to complete his great ivork, cannot noiv he Jcnown." 

We have reached the conclusion, therefore, that there is no good 
reason to believe, and certainly no satisfactory evidence on Avliich 
to found the opinion, that had Mr. Lincoln survived the war he 
v/ould have been either willing or able to withstand the oppressions 
of the malicious and revengeful men in his cabinet and in Con- 
gress in their determination to further punish the people of the 
already prostrate and bleeding South, to which condition of afairs 
he had done so much to contribute. A striking evidence of this is 
furnished by the statement of Admiral Porter, who was with Mr. 
Lincoln when he came to Eichmond immediately after the evacu- 
ation. Admiral Porter says that when Lincoln told him he had 
authorized the re-assembling of the Virginia Legislature, and began 
to reflect on what Seward would have to say about this, he (Lin- 
coln) sent a messenger post haste to General Weitzel and revoked 
the order before he left Richmond. (See Porter's Naval History, 
p. 779. 

Although Andrew Johnson was, as we heard General Wise sav of 
him, "as dirty as cart-wheel grease," we have always believed he 
withstood the malice of these bad men longer than Mr. Lincoln 
would have done, and that he (Johnson) really tried to help the 
South after the war, as we know that he tried to prevent the 
adoption and carrying out of the wicked "Eeconstruction'' measures. 

We know that on May 9, 1865, within less than a month from 
his inauguration, Johnson issued an executive order restoring Vir- 
ginia to the Union; that on the 22d of the same month he pro- 
claimed that all the Southern ports, except four in Texas, should 
be opened to foreign commerce on July 1, 1865 ; that on the 29th of 
May he issued a general amnesty proclamation (with some notable 
exceptions), after which the irreconcilable differences between him 
and his party became so fierce and bitter that he was obstructed 
in every way possible, and came very near being impeached, and 



32 

mainly on account of liis attempted acts of kindness to the Soutliern 
people. So that^ we are constrained to say, if Mr. Lincoln was a 
trne friend of the South, "Good Lord, deliver us from our friends." 

CAREER IX DETAIL. 

But let us now examine Mr. Lincoln's career, somewhat in detail, 
and see what we can find in it to entitle him to rank with the good 
and great men of the earth. 

(1) Up to the time he attained his majority he was literally a 
"hewer of wood and a drawer of water." This was, of course, his 
misfortune, a thing for which he was in no way to blame, and we 
only refer to it as a fact, and not by way of reproach to him in any 
sense. 

(■?) For three or four years after attaining his majority, he first 
kept a store, then a post office, did some surveying, and employed 
his leisure hours in studying and ])reparing himself for the Bar. 

(3) He practiced law about twenty-five years, and made but lit- 
tle reputation as a lawyer, beyond the fact that he was regarded 
as a shrewd, sensible and honest lawyer. During this period he was 
sent to the Illinois Legislature four times, but made little or no 
reputation as a legislator. 

(4) In 1847 he was elected to Congress, and served only one 
term. He certainly made no reputation as a member of Congress^ 
unless his speech advocating the right of secession, as referred to 
by Judge Black in his Essays, entitled him to such distinction. 

(5) AYe next hear of him in the canvass with Stephen A. Douglas 
for the Senate, in which he did make reputation both as a ready- 
del:)ater and stump s])eaker, and was regarded as one of the most 
ambitious and shrewdest politicians of his time. He was twice de- 
feated for the Senate, but the reputation won in bis last canvass with 
Douglas laid tlie foimdntion for liis candidacy for the presidency, 
although Seward was. by t'ai- tlio foremost candidate for that oRice 
up to the time of tlie meeting of the Convention. This convention, 
fortunately for Lincoln, met in Chicago, Avhere his "boosters" did 
most effective work in his behalf. He was only nominated by means 
of a corrupt bargain entered into between his representatives and 
those of Simon Cameron, of I'ennsylvania, and Caleb B. Smith, 



33 

of Indiana, by which Cabinet positions were pledged both to Cameron 
and to Smith in consideration for the votes controlled by them, in 
the convention, and which pledges Lincoln fulfilled, and, in that way 
made himself a party to these corrupt bargains. {1 Morse, 169; 
Lam on, 449.) He was nominated purely as the sectional candidate 
of a sectional party, and not only received no votes in several 
of the Southern States, hut he failed to get a popular majority of 
the section which nominated and elected him, and received nearly 
one million votes less than a popular majority of the vote of the 
country. (1 Morse, 178.) 

(6) After his election, he sneaked into the national Capitol at 
night in a way he was, and ought to have been, ashamed of the rest 
of his life, and commenced his administration by acts of deceit and 
duplicity and by palpable violations of the Constitution he had sworn 
to support, as already set forth herein, and by plunging the country 
into war without any authority or justification for so doing. 

( 7 ) At the end of two years his administration had become so un- 
popular and was deemed so inefficient, that the appointment of a 
Dictator was seriously considered, and Lamon says, if Grant had 
not succeeded in capturing Yicksburg in July 1863, "certain it is 
that President Lincoln would have been deposed, and a Dictator 
would have been placed in his stead as chief executive, until peace 
could be restored to the nation by separation or otherwise." {La- 
mon s Recollections, 183-4.) 

(8) We have already alluded to his standing with the Northern 
people at the election in Xovember, 1864, when nearly one-half of 
these people voted against him, and when, but for the improper use 
of the army in controlling the election, it is believed he would have 
been defeated by McClellan, since in many of the States carried by 
Lincoln the popular vote was very close. (See Butler's Book and 
McClellan s Platform.) 

(9) Between the time of his second election and his assassination, 
the South had become so completely exhausted, that he had only to 
keep his armies, as already marshalled, in the field, to accomplish its 
defeat. Says Lamon : 

"At the time McClellan took command of that army (Army 
of the Potomac), the South was powerful in all the elements of 
successful warfare. It had much changed when General Grant 



34 

took command. Long strain had greatly weakened and ex- 
hausted the resources of the South." {Lamon's Recollections, 
p. 199.) 

(10) And Lamon says of him at the time of his election: 

"Few 2nen believed that Mr. Lincoln possessed a single quali- 
fication for his great office."' * * * "They said he was 
good and honest and well meaning, Init they took care not to 
pretend that he was great. He was thoroughly convinced that 
'there was too much truth in this view of his character. He 
felt deeply and keenly his lack of experience in the conduct 
of public affairs. He spoke then and afterwards about the 
duties of the presidency with much diffidence, and said with a 
story about a justice of the peace in Illinois, that they consti- 
tuted his 'great first case misunderstood.' " (Lamon, p. 468.) 

That he had no just appreciation of the gravity of the situation, or 
of the duties ofthe office he was about to assume, is best evinced by 
the character of the speeches made by him en route to Washington 
to be inaugurated. Of these speeches, the Xorthern historian, 
Ehodes. (3 Rhodes, 303), thus writes: 

"In his speeches the commonplace abounds, and though he 
had a keen sense of humor, his sallies of wit grated on earnest 
men, who read in quiet his daily utterances. The ridiculous, 
which lies so near the sublime, was reached when this man, 
proceeding to grave duties, and the great fame that falls to few 
in the whole world, asked at the town of Westfield, for a little 
girl correspondent of his, at whose suggestion he had made a 
change in his personal appearance, and when she came, he kissed 
her and said, 'You see I have let these whiskers grow for you, 
Grace.' " 

But let us ask, can states)nanship be predicated of any Atney-i- 
can, who expressed the opinion, as Mr. Lincoln did, that the rela- 
tions of the States to the Union were the same as those of the 
counties to the States of which they severally formed a part? 
Surely comment is unnecessary. 

Mr. Lincoln had in his cabinet five of the ablest men then 
in the country, and we think it fair to assume that these men 
are entitled to much, if not most, of the credit (if it can be so 
called) now so recklessly and unsparingly ascribed to him. But 
did it require genius or ability in any man, or set of men, to wear 
out, as bv "attrition," six hundrcil thousand half-starved and 



35 

poorly equipped men Avith two million eight hundred thousand 
well-fed and thoroughly equipped men with unlimited resources 
of all kinds ? 
Xapoleon said : 

"A uum who has exhihited no evidence of greatness hefore 
reaching forty, has no element of greatness in him." 

Mr. Lincoln was fifty-two when he was elected President, and 
Lamon says no one pretended he had developed any element of 
greatness up to that time. 

So that, with every disposition to write truthfully ahout Mr. 
Lincoln, we are unahle to find in his career any suhstantial basis 
for the great name and fame now claimed for him by his admirers 
both at the Xorth and at the South, and certainly nothing either 
in his character, career or conduct to engender veneration, admira- 
tion and love for his memory on the part of the people of the 
South. 

can't rely on what is now written. 

The fact is, most of the Northern, as well as some Southern, 
writers have so distorted and exaggerated nearly every word and 
act of Mr. Lincoln's that it is impossible to arrive at the truth 
about anything said or done by, or concerning him or his 
career from their statements. Many illustrations of this could 
be given, but owing to the length of this paper, one or two 
must suffice. Perhaps nothing that Mr. Lincoln ever said 
or did has been so applauded as his Gettysburg speech, a 
speech of about twenty lines in length, embodying less than a 
dozen thoughts, not original, l)ut very well expressed. Lamon 
says he was present at the time of the delivery of that speech; 
that it fell perfectly fiat on the audience^ and Mr. Everett and 
Mr. Seward expressed great disappointment at it. Mr. Lincoln 
himself said: "7< fell lil-e a 'irrf, hlanket,' and I am distressed 
about it." * * * "It is a flat failure and the people are dis- 
appointed." {Lamon s Recollections, 171-3.) x\nd Lamon then 

adds : 

"In the face of these facts, it has been repeatedly published 
that this speech was received by the audience with loud demon- 
strations of approval ; that amid the tears, sobs and cheers it 
produced on the excited throng, the orator of the day, Mr. 
Everett, turned to Mr. Lincoln, grasped his hand and ex- 



36 

claimed, 'I congratulate you on your success/ adding in a 
transport of heated enthusiasm, 'Ah, Mr. President, how 
gladly would I give my hundred pages to be the author of 
your twenty lines.' Nothing of the kind occurred (says La- 
mon). It is a slander on Mr. Everett, an injustice to Mr. 
Lincoln and a fahification of history." {Idem, p. 172-3.) 

Again (and we would not refer to this but for the fact that it 
is discussed by several of his biographers with almost shameless 
freedom) : The relations Ijetween Mr. Lincoln and his wife were 
notoriously unpleasant. After he had fooled her even when the 
day had been set for their marriage and the bridal party had 
assembled, by failing to appear, Lamon says: "They were mar- 
ried, but they understood each other, and suffered the inevitable 
consequences as other people do under similar circumstances. But 
such troubles seldom fail to find a tongue, and it is not strange 
that in this case neighbors and friends, and ultimately the whole 
country, came to know the state of things in that house. Mr. 
Lincoln scarcely attempted to conceal it, but talked of it with little 
or no reserve to his wife's relatives as well as his own friends." 
{Lamon, 474. See also 3 Ilenidon-Weil-, 429-30.) Herndon says : 
*'I do not believe he knew what happiness was for twenty years." 
''Terrible" was the word which all his friends used to describe him 
in the black mood. "It was 'terrible,' it was 'terrible,' says one and 
another." {Lamon, 475; 1 Moise, 64-5.) 

And yet, in the face of this testimom', one of his latest biog- 
raphers (Noah Brooks), writing for the series of ''Heroes of the 
Nations," says: 

"The reJations of Lincoln and his irife irere a model for the 
married people of the republic of wJtich they were the fore- 
most pair." (P. 422.) 

Verily, as Dr. Lord says : 

"Nothing so effeciually ends all jealousies, animosities and 
prejudices as the assassin's dagger." {12 Beacon Lights of 
History, 314.) 

So that, we repeat, you have to take everything written or said 
about Mr. Lincohi, by most of the Northern and some Southern 
writers, ivitli many grains of allowance, for there seems to be no 
bounds to their exaggerations and misrepresentations. It is not out 
of place to add here that one of his biographers, Hapgood, says 



37 

foreign writers have written but little about Mr. Lincoln, which 
would seem to indicate that they are yet waiting to learn the truth 
about him. 

We cheerfully admit that Mr. Lincoln was an honest man in 
the sense that he was absolutely free from what is now termed 
"graft," and that he never manifested any disposition to '"put 
money in his purse" which did not properly belong there. He 
may have been a patriot, too, in the usual acceptation of that 
term; but as we diagnose his patriotism, it was so intermingled 
with, and controlled by, an inordinate personal ambition it is 
impossible to say how far that predominated. Certainly his readi- 
ness to sacrifice the lives and property both of his friends and his 
foes would seem to show a recklessness and heartlessness more 
consistent with ambition than with any characteristic which was 
noble and good. If he was a patriot or a statesman at all, he 
ought certainly to have known that a union "pinned together 
with bayonets," enforced by the power of coercion, "against the 
consent of the governed" in a large part of that union, could never 
he the ''Union" as formed by "our fathers." 

"Popular beliefs in time come to be superstitions, and create 
both gods and devils," says Don Piatt, in speaking of how little is 
now known of the "Eeal Lincoln." (Men Who Saved the Union, 
p. 28.) And the same writer further says: 

"There is no tyranny so despotic as that of public opinion 
among a free people. The rule of the majority is to tlie last 
extent exacting and brutal, and when brought to bear on our 
eminent men, it is also senseless." (Idem, p. 27.) 

The North has had and has exercised the "rule of the majority" 
over the South for nearly half a century, and in many respects that 
rule has truly been "exacting and brutal," and especially is this 
true in their attempts to make us fall down and worship their false 
gods. Let us never consent to do so. No, 

"Better the spear, the blade, the bowl, 
Than crucifixion of the soul." 

We are not vain enough to think that what we have said to-night 
will have any other effect than to inform the members of this Camp 
of the true character and conduct of this contradictory, strange and 
secretive man, but we are vain enough to think that you, at least. 



38 

will believe tliat what we have said to you ire heJleve to be the truth, 
and nothing hut the truth. And we further believe that if the 
cause espoused by Mr. Lincoln had not been deemed successful^ 
and if the "assassin's bullet" had not contrilnited so greatly to im- 
mortalize him, his name would be now bandied about as only that 
of an ordinary, coarse, secretive, cunning man and ivily politician, 
and one of the greatest tyrants of any age. 

But it will doubtless be rej^lied to all these things, that, admit- 
ting their truth, "He saved the Union, and the end icas ivorth and 
justified the means." 

If this was an argument at all, we might feel the force of it, 
viewing the matter from a N^orthern standpoint. But, in our 
opinion, any such attempted answer is an evasion, and "beg- 
ging the question'' now under discussion. The real ([ucstion is, not 
what was accomplished, but ichat was the character and conduct of 
the man, and what were the methods and instruments employed by 
him to do his worl-? Was the character of Abraham Lincoln such as 
to make him an ideal and exemplar for our children, and were the 
methods employed by him such as to excite and comnumd the 
reverence, admiration and emulation of those who come after us? 
We answer. No; a thousand times, Xo. 

REASONS FOR THIS PARP^R. 

But some will doubtless ask, and with apparent justification. Is 
it not wrong in this Camp to bring forward these things, especially 
at this time, when so much is, ostensibly, being done to allay sec- 
tional feeling between the North and the South ? 

The answer to all such inquiries is, to our mind, perfectly sim- 
ple and satisfactory. In the first ])hice, these efforts to allay sec- 
tional bitterness are far more apparent than real, as any one whO' 
has read the histories and current literature which has teemed 
from Northern presses ever since the war, and is still issuing from 
those presses, will be forced to admit. These histories and this 
literature, written almost wholly hy our con(pierors, naturally give 
their side of the conflict, and they not only exalt their leaders, and 
seek especially to deify Mr. Lincohi. l)ut they misrepresent the 
cause and the motives of the Southern people, and vilify us and 
our leader, Mr. Davis, in the most flagrant and outrageous way. 
Mr. Lincoln is portrayed, as we have seen, as a num of ineffable 



39 

purity, piety and patriotism, and his cause as the cause of hu- 
manity, ])atriotisni and righteousness, whilst Mr. Davis was the 
Arch traitor and felon, our cause that of treason, rehellion and in- 
humanity, our people are denominated a '"slave oligarchy," and 
their only reason for going to war was to prolong their "slave 
power," with no higher moti^■e than to save the money value of 
their slaves. As an illustration of the way our people have heen 
misrepresented and nuiligned, we need only refer to the fact that 
such a Xorthern writer as James Eussell Lowell has preserved in 
his most permanent form of literature statements that during the 
war our Southern women "wore personal ornaments made of the 
bones of their unhuried foes" ; that we wilfully "starved prisoners," 
"^'took scalps for trophies," and we are called "rebels" and "traitors," 
deserving punishment for our crimes as such, when we were only 
defending our homes against ruthless invasion. In a word, that 
we are a had people, led by those who were worse, whilst they 
are all good people, led by those who did and could do no irrong. 
These things are taught to our children by the literature to which 
we have referred, and the effect of such teaching must in the end 
make them deplore, if they do not come to despise, the cause and 
conduct of their fathers. 

It is proper to say that there are some fair-minded and truthful 
Northern writers, who, whilst differing from us as to the justice of 
our cause, have had the manliness and candor to say that we were 
honest and i^atriotic in the course we pursued, and these have 
written kindly and considerately about us, our cause and some of 
our leaders, and to all such we express our appreciation and grati- 
tude. But the great mass of Xorthern histories and literature is 
such as Ave have descrilied them, and especially is this true of the 
biographies and literature concerning the life, the conduct and 
character of Mr. Lincoln, the writers of these, as a rule, apparently 
seeming to think they could only exalt their subject Ijy belittling and 
belying us, our cause and our leaders. 

The members of this Camp are all ex-Confederate soldiers; they 
loved the Confederate cause, and they love it still; they believed it 
was right when they enlisted in its defence, and they believe so noiv; 
they gave their young manhood, they sufPered, they made sacrifices; 
many of them shed their blood, and have seen thousands of their 
comrades die on the field, in hospitals and in prisons in defence 



40 

of that cause ; the}^ Imow that many of the things written about the 
cause and conduct of the North, and its leaders, and especially about 
Mr. Lincoln, are false. Are we so debased and cowed by the 
results of the conflict that we must remain silent about these for 
the sake of political expediency or material gain, and not tell 
our children ilie iriith, when our quondam enemies have furnished 
us the evidences of tliat truth? If we do, then, in our opinion, we 
are unworthy of our Confederate uniforms, and to have been the 
followers of Lee and Jackson and their compeers. If we remain 
silent, can we expect those who come after us to speak? Nay, will 
they not rather interpret oiir silence as a confession of guilt, and 
that we deemed our cause an unholy one ? So that, it seems to us, 
this address not only finds its justification on the low plea of 
"retaliation in kind," but that its justification rests upon the im- 
pregnahle foundations of truth and necessity, as icell as that of a 
duty tve owe alike to the memories of our dead comrades, to our- 
selves, our children and our children's children. 

"Ye shall l-now the truth, and the truth shall male you free." 



SrARY OF CONGRESS 




